Jack Cope

Who was Jack Cope?

Jack Cope was a South African novelist, short story writer, poet, and editor.

Jack Cope was born in Natal, South Africa and home-schooled by tutors. From the age of 12 he boarded at Durban High School in Durban, afterwards becoming a journalist on the Natal Mercury and then a political correspondent in London for South African newspapers. At the outbreak of the Second World War, in a state of some disillusionment, he returned to South Africa. He moved Cape Town, where he worked for the left-wing Guardian newspaper from 1941 to 1955, in various capacities including cultural critic and, at one stage, general editor. [Zug, 2007]

He married his second cousin, the artist Lesley De Villiers in 1942. They separated in 1958 and were divorced in the early 1960s. They had two sons, Raymond, and Michael.

Jack Cope is also well known for his romantic attachment to South African poet Ingrid Jonker.